Forum:Reboot the Fanon
This is a discussion about the merits (or lack thereof) of deleting all the content and starting fresh. Eventually we may vote on whether or not we do just that. There's a lot of good content that could be brought back with some editing. There's some shitty content that was founded on a decent idea, with the proper execution it could go back up as well. We could also get all our templates straightened out and exercise greater control over sensitive, frequently fucked up material such as Vaults, the Enclave, and the Brotherhood of Steel. We could chart out a complete version of what our canon will be beforehand. Thoughts? Doesn't that seem a little extreme? I realize that you're trying to improve the site, and that's an admirable goal, but I'm not sure that this is the way that you want to go about it. Not to mention that many users may leave if the site is suddenly wiped clean. We'd experience a serious drop in membership and in new users, and that's not a good thing. The fanon is not beyond fixing, I hope. What we really need is to galvanize the site into a massive cleaning effort which, unfortunately, hasn't been happening. This is in part my fault for not helping you out there, as I realize that you were trying to do that, but this seems a little extreme. I'll support you if you do decide to "reboot the fanon", but I personally don't think that it's the best idea. The only way your idea seems fair is if all users back-up their own articles and the admins back up the rest (Timeline, categories, etc). Users that will not take the effort to back-up their stuff will risk losing everything they wrote. Some improvements I'd like to see in a potential "new" Tranquility Lane: *Form a "judging committee" with the best writers (voting might be necessary) and admins who judge all new articles (maybe marked with a pending approval template) on consistency to established canon, quality, etc. and give feedback or delete it altogether. This will greatly improve fanon quality. *Revoke editing privileges of all anonymous/IP editors. These guys sometimes show up, write a short WIP article about some "awsum" character in the Capital Wasteland and never come back to finish it. Especially with the current attention on the future release of New Vegas such editors (and vandals alike) could show up more. *Become stricter in upholding the site's rules and keep Tranquility Lane a pleasant place to work. If people are repeatedly not willing to take criticism or behave like assholes, swipe them with the banhammer (and no second chances). If people break any of the rules, warn them and guide them in the right direction. I have more ideas to improve the post-deletion Wikia, but I want to see how this plays out first. Personally, I support a reboot, since we can now apply what we've learned over time and make Tranquility Lane much more organized and plausible. Those are some good points guys. As I said, there's a good amount of stuff that could be put back up with just a little editing. I would absolutely encourage everyone to save their material. It just seems as if it would be easier to erase everything for the time being rather than me going through 500+ articles asking what everyone thinks about each one before erasing it. There are also some articles which are an unholy mess, such as the fanon timeline. It's necessary, but look at that thing! Ovaltine, you crazy. Instead of simply wiping the damn slate clean, Make two fallout universes for the RP site. One of which can be a "clean start" and the other is the one we have here. We'll call them A/B, or 1/2, or Universe Pepsi and Universe Coke. All of the sites material can be considered A, unless the author slams a big ass message calling it "B" at the top. B could be for people that say, didn't like the idea of moving an entire faction in Fallout 3 across the country. (Looking at you, Brotherhood Outcasts). Or just don't like the fact that there are three super soldiers running around, or having the entire US of A, nuked the fuck out of from space two hundred years after china did it the first time. Oh hell no, this is some shit. What the people here are suggesting seems AWFULLY FAMILIAR. But anyway, I completely agree with a wipe-out because I know from experience a massive clean-up always attracts whiners who can't cope with their inability to write something good. My problem with the two universe idea is that it would get confusing and cumbersome: do we have two articles for something that exists in both or do we hope that every author can properly organize their articles to explain how the subject exists and is (or isn't) different in both? I don't think we need to have a million articles for the sake of having a million articles, having a smaller number of well written, neatly organized articles is better for our purposes: references for story writing, mod inspiration, and roleplaying. I've tried to streamline the existing site (Miscellaneous Characters), but there's still a lot of outright shit and decent stuff that needs fixing. I could be given carte blanche to fix things as I saw fit, but it would inevitably annoy someone and I just don't have that kind of time. I'd like to work with everyone to fix things and I think the best way is to start fresh and go item by item. I actually don't like the idea of just destroying everything that was written, enacting new site rules, and then bringing it all back in with minor revisions. If we're going to do this, we need to exclude certain articles period. No more AWA, Crusade, or any of that garbage at all. No more Warrior Weapons. No more "super awesome" characters. Very little, if any, BoS splinter groups. Even established characters, like Silas, need some changes. Anything that is connected to our messy and confused timeline in any way needs drastic change. If we're not going to change on many of these points, there's really no point in conducting this massive sweep in the first place. I don't actually mind any of that myself, I'd be fine with eliminating or significantly changing these things. I think we're all in agreement that the huge militant factions and elaborate BoS and Enclave splinter groups were a huge mistake. This fanon has known for a long time that those large militant factions are the problem, actually, they know that their OWN articles have been a problem, FURTHER, they know that the articles they continue to feed with new RPs and character additions have been the problem and everyone who is aware of the preceding things continues to do those thigns while preaching that this fanon needs to get rid of all those large militant factions. People here are fucking ridiculous. Edit: Someone tell me how the rpt template works ^.^ You got the rpt part right, just put four tildes in between. C4, your preachy crap isn't helping anybody. We know that these articles are a problem, which is why we're discussing the massive site-wide change in the first place. If you have something valuable to contribute on new policies to implement or something similar please, by all means, help us out. Otherwise, however, please refrain. Pointing fingers never helps fix anything. Plus, aren't we going to have to alert every member who's made an article about us deleting it? I don't suppose there's some sort of site wide alert system? Twentyfists, your whining isn't doing that much good either. If you want to do something other than bitch AND be a hypocrite, then please do it. That's some good shit if you think I need to be lectured by you. I'm not pointing fingers, I'm putting it out there how futile you all make valid efforts on here. Please stop being jerks to each other. C4, your custom signature thing doesn't work, just use the four tildes. CP, I don't know about anything other than the digest, assuming all users even get that. Perhaps C4 or Run would know. @CP: We could make one of those news banner things that show up when something important happens. That would alert everyone who visits the site that we were doing something drastic. I suppose we could use talk pages too, but that seems a little inefficient. @C4: I've been trying to help out with this plan of Ovaltine's. I have NOT been "bitching and being a hypocrite". I realize that my own articles are part of the problem, and I'm trying to help fix that. If you think that I should point out how people here are "fucking ridiculous", call them out as "hypocrites", and support this change to weed out the "whiners", I think I'll have to disagree. I want to keep this discussion civil, and your posts are making that very difficult. @Ovaltine: I'm done now, by the way. The banner at the top would be the most efficient way of informing everyone but you'd have to place it a week or two in advance to give everyone a chance to moan and accept it. Both of you, knock it off. And I don't see how the universe thing is that complicated. Putting B ARTICLE at the top of your page isn't that hard. Putting A/B at the top is only a smidge harder. Besides, when a new member looks and see's "We currently have 21 articles", it doesn't make the site any more attractive to them. Screaming at new members because they don't understand the universe separation doesn't make this look too attractive either. I don't like the Universe thing because that makes everything increasingly confusing to deal with. Plus, it doesn't really fix that everything here has a very "un-Fallout" twist to it. Anyway, it just sounds like the old "Universe system" we implemented after one of our dick-swinging RPs, and we saw how well that went over. I'll rejoin the conversation later, I'm rather pissed off for a couple of reasons. How about this: we put up a notice on the front page and give everyone 30 days to back up their content. Then we have some new standards in place, here are some: * Articles about canon areas and factions are subject to approval, perhaps by an admin or panel. * Mercenary outfits, militias, and raider clans are subject to approval. * New creatures and pieces of equipment are subject to approval. * Characters, including characters that are members of canon factions or those who live in canon locations are not subject to approval as long as they represent somewhat typical members of those groups or places. For example: A Brotherhood Knight, an Enclave mechanic, or an NCR rancher would be okay; a Brotherhood Elder, an Enclave senior officer, or an NCR senator would be subject to approval. Not necessary. Just a heavy revision on newly added articles are necessary and all new members (and old alike) should be made aware that their articles are subject to deletion if they do not meet certain standards or violate the fallout-esque sense that the fanon is trying to keep. Basically, it's a matter of starting fresh and nipping any bad articles in the bud. Be more strict, do not succumb to whining. That way things would be back to how they are now in no-time. What I said earlier and what Ovaltine wrote seems perfect. A strict and well moderated place without the garbage that currently shows up from time to time. There is a difference between strict moderation and some fascist bullshit. Nobody wants to join a fanon where they have to wait for approval before anyone sees what they've written. Making it better without killing it is possible. Unless I am misunderstand the definition of "approval" (as I understand it, it means that you'd have to suggest the article to a mod before it showing up on the site) The approval system I had envisioned is slightly different. You type an article, replace the WIP template for an awaiting approval template when you're satisfied and wait for a response from the approval team. Your work will be readable the whole time. An approval system like that is in my opinion the only way to bring more quality to the Wiki. Being judged and getting feedback from the admins and good writers can help you become better. And best of all, it will make users think twice before uploading a bullshit article about some Übersoldat or million-member faction. Ofcourse, voting for members of this approval team is needed, but that can be worked out later. Also, I don't think it's a smart idea to give the members of the team admin privileges, just let the admins do all the deleting of bad articles. That type of system I would agree with. I think that Xterror's idea would work fairly well, although implanting it would prove rather difficult. As for the whole site wipe, I think it is a good idea. People now are just too connected with their work, supporting it with the obscene idea that if you spent a certain amount of time on something, you have to keep it forever. It's a type of materialism, seem often in literary works such as these, but it is just a mindset. The point of fictitious fan writing like this is merely for entertainment, it's not to send a political message or have some deep meaning that the author wants to spread, it's just entertainment, a time killer. And so, wiping it clean would not be a loss in any way, it would just open more opportunities for new members to add onto their own Fallout universe and for the existing member to touch new horizons in writing. I hadn't worked out a system for approval, but I like Xterror's idea. I also like the idea of seperating the admins from the approval process (other than offering opinions). Wouldn't mind it. I like Xterror's idea. I'm also okay with just resetting everything, if that's the route people want to go. Whichever way we go with, I can say this the wrong people were left on too loose a leash for too long (everyone knows who I mean by that), and the wrong ideas gained too much momentum (no prizes for guessing which Super Soldier Project is the biggest offender in that category). As long as I can sort something out with Twentyfists and KuHB1aM about their Warrior Weapons, I wouldn't mind seeing that headwreck gone (I'd probably even be happy), even if we don't reset everything. Get Jacob back to what he was to begin with, a Regulator gone wrong (rather than brainwashed Super Soldier gone Regulator gone wrong) and shift Hale away from the Super Soldier side (it was never a big part of his story anyway). How about we finalize our new standards and then announce a vote open to every registered member who had a complete article as of yesterday? Fine by me. I'd be fine removing Vladimir from the site completely. Since there'd be no AWA, there'd be no Vladimir, really. I'd be much happier with wastelanders anyway. --Twentyfists 18:39, February 11, 2010 (UTC) I'll have a chat with KuH over on the 40k fanon wiki then. I'll be able to get in touch with him sooner over there. Then we can all wash our hands of the Warrior Weapons. And then, who knows? The Claws? Sure, it'd mean pretty much resetting the RPs, but I'd gladly go through them again without the influence of Weaboo Inc. We might even be able to shift the whole RP series away from Faction Wars! We need to define our approval panel. How about this: * The approval panel will be a 3-5 member body. * Any non-admin registered member with a complete article can nominate themselves to be a member. * A straight yes-or-no vote by registered members with a complete article will decide if a nominee becomes a panelist. * Upon the completion of an article, the panel will review it to make certain it is consistent with canon and fanon, along with the general spirit of the Fallout series. * A simple majority vote can approve the article and remove its work in progress tag. * If an article does not pass, it keeps its tag and the panel will provide suggestions for improvement. * The author has 30 day to make the necessary improvements. If they are made, the tag is removed, if not the article is deleted. * Deletion of an article in need of improvement does not bar it from being remade later if the improvements are included. If the article is resubmitted as it was, it will be deleted again. * If a panelist's article is up for review, the panelist in question will recuse themselves and an admin will take their place. A friendly hello from the Kuhblam. I love how you guys are trying to turn the site around, and I was recently approached by Run4 on the status of Dutch and my "awsumsauce" characters. Just went on a Deletion template spree. I see a few of the members from my time and before are still here, including the ones that joined after. My eyes have recently opened; now, I have a different place that fits into Mary-Sueing :P. I do concede that C4 was indeed right (you cheeky little bastard :P ) on the Mary-Sueing going to extremes, and if ever I am required for something to help with (and I'm pretty sure I won't be), let me know. Once again, just saying Hi and good luck with your reforms. I hope you guys make the wiki like it was before our cock-dangling wars. KuHB1aM 22:23, February 11, 2010 (UTC) So, when do we start? And what kind of stuff will be deleted, and what things would be able to stay with changes? Cause I'm (actually) ok with most of my articles being deleted, just some things (like Ronto) I'd like to stay. I'm completely fine with my Mary Sue stuff (MR-6, Sam) being deleted or extremely modified to fit (if the Outcasts still exist). Now that most of the RP's are going to dissapear, might I suggest deleting a little fellow named Jack.... I wouldn't suggest deleting the RP's, maybe just giving them a special title and keeping them. This is because I still like to reread them from time to time, and they were good stories, and made for good reading. Maybe we could delete the significantly shittier ones, but keep the glorious ones, like Outcasts and such. Also, would Austin be deleted? I can understand how it is an Enclave branch-off, but I could simmer it down a large amount, this is really only because I would hate myself for deleting the whole Ramsey family. I've been writing a fan-fiction about them for some time now, it's already about half-way through, and I'd really feel horrible if it would end up being obsolete. As with Ramsey, I'd really hate to loose Austin, simply because I still have a large storyline for the Burton Family. Also, what about the Western RP? But I do support the site reboot, simply because of so many people that have come and gone and left incomplete and shitty articles. Now that I think about it, most of the wiki timeline is based off of events that occurred because of people or groups that will be subject to deletion. Since we're starting afresh, what will be the "standard year" that we refer to as the "present day"? Currently, it's around 2291 or so, but what would it be after the site cleanup? I think it should start earlier that 2291 or else we'll have to face newer, more powerful weapons and factions. Well, the wiki does not have a set present, only a timeline and universe, there is no certain year that is considered the now. Per say, one could create an article that only has history until the 2100's, and it would be perfectly okay. One could also create an RP set in some previous time, they do not have to be set in some certain year. Most are set at 2291 now because everybody, in the beginnings of the wiki, set their fanon in the Fallout 3 timeframe, which was 2277, and it just continued on from there. Well, seen the fact that the Fanon rules discourage articles taking place after 2300, I think that's the present. I've written all my articles according to that and having a timeframe of 223 years (2077 - 2300) gives you the opportunity to give your characters and locations so much more history and depth. Xterror seems right. Plenty of time for any characters or groups to build up a story and such. Although you would most likely be confined to the later part of the period because of the sheer amount of radioactive shit on the surface that would kill you. Not necessarily. The Exodus occurred less than a week after the Great War and despite suffering casualties in the wastes, the travelers managed to reach Lost Hills and founded the BoS. I think Fanon characters should be able to survive as well as long as the author keeps the dangers that are present in the aftermath of a nuclear war in mind. Well it would be possible, yes. I didn't take into account the fact that not every place on Earth has been nuked, although a lot of it has been affected with some form of radiation. As long as they stayed away from major radioactive hell-holes (i.e. the White House for example), they would be fine. I remember reading somewhere that the world really only still became safe to live in the open after a few decades. Although it may have been something to do with V101, and they lied to people about the world being dangerous. It's debatable, I suppose, depending on the region, really. Ireland, for example, would be dangerous for a long time, such a small place hit by two nukes (one of them an ICBM aimed at GB that was blown off-course by the airburst of another nuke, I'll elaborate as I finish the page up). If you're all game, I could write up and present new versions of the RP events, featuring the same characters but retooled to be consistent with Fallout and each other, to fit a smaller (that is to say, no giant cock-dangling wars factions) scale, and remove all traces of the unholy trinity. I don't entirely agree with the idea of deleting everything but Xterror's idea is acceptable to me, I was going to get round to rewriting most of my stuff eventually to set it more in line with the cannon.(Axing Vegas completely and downscaling San Diego).I don't entirely agree with the judging committee though as i think it goes against the whole idea of wikia. How does a judging committee go against the idea of Wikia? If you take a look at Wikipedia, you'll see that articles get deleted or rewritten over the smallest inconsistencies. I still think that if everything is judged, quality will greatly improve around here. Speaking of which, maybe TehK (seen the fact that he knows about the technical bits of Wikia) could create the necessary templates, like Awaiting Approval (to be placed by the author) and Approved! (placed by the judges/admins). I suppose we don't have to delete everything if everyone would agree to go over their articles and edit them so as to remove the Mary Sue/Uberfaction aspects. I still like the panel idea however. Suppose we could assemble the panel, and let anyone link pages that they reckon need the panel's attention to the Discussion Page to save time by getting everyone to throw in. Then we need to vote first and in my opinion all current and future articles need to be approved. Perhaps only the most "worrisome" articles need to be linked to at this moment. Agreed on the worrisome part. I'm inclined to agree on the current and future articles thing too. Hey-ho. It would seem that I'm back. For what it's worth, I think that some articles may be beyond saving. but deleting everything would be a waste. Couldn't we find a way to archive some of it, keep it around in case we want to re-implement any of it? C4 here, Eagle; I don't really see the downside of deleting everything. The way I see it, it gives us all an opportunity to remake the fanon, bring some new ideas here. What about some of the better stuff? Jacob vaughton and all those articles that everyone loves, they gonna get deleted too? Really tho, im all for it. wipe that shit! What would become of my current WIP article, Francesco Romano? would I be able to continue working on it? also, is it just me, or is the wikia like dead or something? Jacob's already undergone overhaul (and is still in the process of post Warrior Weapon repairs). It's still up in the air about what's going to be axed and what isn't. Hence the approval thing. I see. but seriously, did everyone leave? also, if the deleting thing happens, when will it happen? seems like it would make more sense to wait until the deleting was done before making a new article... Dunno about activity, but I just reverted back to what Jacob was before the arrival of the Super Soldier on the wiki. Im not sure if someone already mentioned this, but I think that we should find some way to standardize time periods. With the old stuff, I always assumed that it all existed at the same time. every article had a "what he/she/they is/are doing now", but i bet that none of the articles defined "now" as the same time period. I personally favor 2300 as the present time. It gives you a lot of space to create an in-depth history of your article, as I mentioned somewhere earlier on this page. Yeah, 2300 makes sense. I like it. Also, I for one say we should just avoid places like D.C. and other canon places ENTIRELY. That would restrict fanon only to that timeline, so if some user wanted to create fanon regarding the previous Fallout games instead of only Fallout 3, they could not, for there is not enough information regarding California or any of the west coast in the 2300's. That being said, I must restate that this Wiki should not have a 'present time'. When you create an article, it could be set on any date in the Fallout universe, only because this wiki is simply a database of fan fiction regarding the Fallout universe, it does not have to be restricted to a certain time and date. I tried to tell you this earlier, but it seemed that nobody listened, so I'll post it again: The wiki does not have a set present, only a timeline and universe, there is no certain year that is considered the now. Per say, one could create an article that only has history until the 2100's, and it would be perfectly okay. One could also create an RP set in some previous time, they do not have to be set in some certain year. Most are set at 2291 now because everybody, in the beginnings of the wiki, set their fanon in the Fallout 3 timeframe, which was 2277, and it just continued on from there. I'm not pushing for site-wide deletion anymore, though I would embrace it. I would be satisfied with some revisionism and cutting dead weight. If you all trust me to do so, I could just start pruning at my own discretion. OP's idea works for me. either way, I figure most of my stuff should get hacked. Prehaps a mixture of both ideas,Op can start pruning stuff and when certain types of articles are uploaded they need to wait for aproval.Eg im curently drafting ideas for a group in eastern france and that would need to be aproved but a wastelander or somthing like that wouldn't. I think what I'll do with not so great characters is, assuming their authors don't request to have them deleted, is summarize and slightly retool them on the Miscellaneous Characters page as I did before. That way if some inactive user returns, some trace of their content remains and they can elect to rewrite it to our new standards. Does this mean that areas will be reset as well? i.e. the maps would be wiped clean and new factions would get to pick their territory? I'm a bit wary when it comes to that topic. I suppose I should preface my thoughts with the following: canon factions have priority when it comes to territory and the NCR is the single largest faction extant. Furthermore, this is in regard to canon factions as represented in canon, so you don't get to make a Brotherhood Squad article and detail how they took over another author's town because the BoS is a canon faction. Having said all that, if a faction is deleted because the necessary improvements are not made, whatever region they occupied would likely be available. While we're on this topic, I think we ought to take ALL of the factions (canon and all surviving fanon) and make a big ass map so anyone who wants to make a new faction can do so and easily find some new territory. I can do this myself (I think) but I would need to wait until all factions have been checked over. Until then, does anyone have any problems with me making a group that occupies part of Michigan? I couldn't agree more with the map idea. Sadly, there's still a lot of chaff to be separated from the wheat, so we will have to wait until this Great Fanon Purge is completed. I had made some excellent progress on just such a map before I was forced to reformat. Naturally I hadn't emailed myself a copy. It included all the canon stuff prior to Fallout 3, and the fanon stuff regarding Texas, New Mexico, Kentucky, and the Great Lakes. Also, if the reboot is getting rid of super soldiers, and fixing or getting rid of the problematic factions, is the Rain of Fire still necessary? Probably not. Depends on how the reboot goes and whatnot. I think I shall start pruning the worst stuff remaining, especially stuff by authors who aren't here any more. Thank you for updating this and to the wiki activities, becuase this brings up a question i was marginally interested in asking; when fallout 4 comes out, will this reboot again? like some sort of spooky monster man (or woman)? add me on MySpace! (talk) 22:12, September 2, 2014 (UTC) No. We'll come up with some other solution, perhaps even the divergence that was brought up in the conversation here.